Evidence of Things Unseen
by SomewhereApart
Summary: For OQ Prompt Party Day 4: #85: Regina tells Robin that she's infertile. Vegas-verse.


_For OQ Prompt Party Day 4: #85: Regina tells Robin that she's infertile. Vegas-verse._

* * *

They've been kissing for… well, for a good long while. She's not sure how long – a good half hour upstairs before they were interrupted, and they've been down here for… long enough that she's started to thoroughly enjoy the way his hands move over her body. Up and down her spine, gripping occasionally at her hips (usually when he moans quietly), threading through her hair. He's not the only one touching – she's made a thoroughly mussed mess of his hair, and his shirt is rumpled from the insistent press and clutch of her hands.

Somehow she's ended up in his lap entirely, her knees pressed into the cushions on either side of his hips as they kiss, and kiss. They're not as close as they _could_ be; if she opened her thighs just a little wider, they could get closer, that obvious bulge she'd seen in his pants earlier could be wedged in tight against where she's slick and slippery and warm.

She hadn't expected _that_ when she'd suggested this. She'd thought she'd just kiss him until he felt… familiar. Until his touch didn't make her jump or fidget.

But it turns out he's very _good_ at this, at making out like a couple of horny teenagers (something she'd probably have been able to anticipate if she could remember their night together in any great detail), and so here they are. Him with a hard-on, and her worrying she's going to end up with a noticeable damp spot on her jeans if he keeps thumbing the side of her breast the way he is.

It's chaste enough, no pressure, nowhere near a nipple. Just the occasional teasing brush of his thumb against the outer curve of her breast when their limbs happen to pass in just the right way – but her breasts are sensitive, _so_ sensitive. Her nipples are achingly hard, and when his thumb grazes her again, all she can think of is how amazing it would feel if she just let him slide that thumb in a little further, let it rub over the hard peaks, let him give them gentle squeezes, or, God, suck on them just a little…

The thought alone is enough to draw a moan up out of her, and Regina yanks their lips apart before she does something crazy like actually let him do all the sinful things she wants.

Things they are not doing, things she made him promise they wouldn't do for the next year.

She scoots back a little for good measure, letting her ass settle comfortably on his knees while she catches her breath and tries to rein in her hormones.

Robin just relaxes into the cushions and smiles at her. He's a little flushed (she is, too, she can feel the heat in her cheeks), and his hair is sticking up at odd angles, his eyes dark and wanting. But he doesn't try anything, only lets his hands coast down her sides, over her hips, to settle on her thighs. He rubs them down, and up – safely on the outside, the top, nowhere that could be misconstrued as demanding.

And then he tells her, "You are so beautiful," and her heart does things.

Silly things – fluttery-hummingbird-wings-in-her-chest type things that she blames on all the kissing. At least she knows she won't have to worry about whether she'll have to pretend to enjoy the occasional public-friendly PDA.

He's a very good kisser. Clearly well-practiced, unless he's just a natural talent.

It's a thought that makes her frown slightly and ask, "How many women have you been with?"

Robin's brows lift, his hands pausing mid-rub. "That's an abrupt shift in topic."

"I'd want to know, if this were real," she tells him with a little shrug, and his hands begin to move again.

His answer is a cagey, "A fair few. How many men?"

Regina smirks, and echoes "A fair few." Turnabout is fair play, after all. Nerves kick up and skitter in her belly as she asks a question she would absolutely demand the answer to, if this weren't just a farce: "Are you clean?"

"Yes," he answers without hesitation; it doesn't do much to settle the nerves, though. Not when he predictably follows it up with, "You?"

Regina licks her lips and tells him, "Presently," and then waits for the potential judgement.

Robin only tilts his head curiously. He'd gotten the unspoken message loud and clear, but he's not pressing the issue, and it's that modicum of respect for her privacy (and the fact that he didn't immediately recoil) that has her feeling safe enough to confess, "Leo cheated."

Robin's jaw clenches slightly at that, and he mutters a bitter, "Bastard."

"Yeah," Regina scoffs, tucking her hair behind her ear and glancing down to avoid Robin's gaze as she sighs a resentful, "Great parting gift."

Looking down was maybe not the best idea; she's now stuck staring straight at his still-very-prominent erection. She shouldn't find it comforting that the revelation of her former STD hadn't had him losing his boner immediately, but she does. She's told herself again and again not to be ashamed of it, that it wasn't in any way her fault, but the stigma is still there. You never know what kind of a slut you're going to be called when you tell a guy you had chlamydia, even if you got it from your cheating bastard of a husband.

But Robin is just… Robin about it. Accepting, like he was of everything else. He settles his hands on her hips and just says, "I thought you said there wasn't a lot of sex toward the end."

"There wasn't." Her shoulder shifts, not really a shrug, just… a need to move, to… do something. She's _uncomfortable_ talking about this, she _doesn't ever_ talk about this. But if they were married, she would, and they _are_ married, so she does. She swallows her discomfort, and explains, "But chlamydia tends to be asymptomatic. He didn't know he had it, and I didn't know I had it. I changed insurance during the divorce, got a new doctor and she did a full work-up. STD panel included."

And the rest, as they say…

"I bet that was a bit of a shock," Robin murmurs sympathetically, and oh, he doesn't know the half of it.

"Yes," she says, and then, "I'd had it for a while. I…"

Just say it, _say it_. She's chosen to trust him with a year of her life, she trusted him with what happened to Daniel and everything that came after. She can trust him with this.

Regina draws a careful breath, stares hard around his bellybutton, and tells him quietly, "I can't have children."

Robin's hands fist at her belt loops, and she glances up to find his jaw clenching again, his eyes angry in a way that makes the hairs stand up on her arms. She knows what angry looks like on a man, and she's all warning bells and coiling muscles, until he mutters darkly, "If I ever meet your ex-husband, I'm going to punch him right in the face."

Oh. Right. He's angry at _Leo_ (the logical culprit, but some reactions are hard to unlearn).

Regina smiles, and relaxes. "Good. But it's...it's okay." It _is,_ it's fine. It's alright. "I probably shouldn't be passing along my mother's genetic material anyway – too much crazy. And there are plenty of kids who need homes."

His gaze turns warm and understanding, his hands unclenching and smoothing over her hips again.

"That's why you want to adopt."

Regina nods, admitting, "I don't really have much in the way of other options. And I like the thought of helping someone – a child – who needs something as simple as a home. Love. I can do that, I can give that."

"I've no doubt," he murmurs fondly, his fingers spreading and splaying to reach her spine. It makes her shiver – which makes him grin, and then he's sliding a hand up to cup behind her neck and draw her in for another quick kiss.

It's nice, the easy affection. Regina could get used to this – shouldn't, and she won't let it go past this, but a few pecks here and there, his fingers scratching gently over her scalp… A year of that isn't sounding so bad right about now.

This might actually be okay, this year of marriage. This year of them. This could work.

She doesn't realize she's been staring until he drags his fingers through the hair at her nape and asks, "What's on your mind, darling?"

Shit. Well. She's certainly not telling him the truth about that.

She lies instead, or rather sidesteps and says, "I don't know why I told you all of that. I don't tell anyone that."

"Because if this were true, I'd know?" he suggests, and yes, that was why, but...

"The only people who know are Leo, my parents, our doctors and our divorce lawyers. I have a gag order," she explains. Because God forbid the public get wind that Leo Blanchard fucked around on the wife he abused, got her sick and left her barren. "I'm not allowed to share that information outside of a marriage. Which, as you know, I haven't been in for a very long time, and never intended to be again."

Robin's expression shifts slightly at that, his lips drawing into a little pout, his gaze far too sympathetic for her liking. Go too far past sympathy and you get pity, and she doesn't want that.

So when he asks, "You've not told anyone since?" she keeps her tone light and dismissive.

"Nope."

He makes this little grimace that grates at her pride a little, but his tone is more quiet understanding when he says, "That sounds… very lonely. Having to keep a secret like that, for the rest of your life."

"Technically, I think it's only for the rest of _his_ life," she teases, and then she shrugs a little, and sobers, and tries to reassure that, "It's alright. I've made peace with it."

Robin nods, but he's still looking at her, his mouth is still pinched, tucking back words he's not brave enough to say, no doubt. What he does say is, "I'm sorry he did that to you," and Regina decides she's done talking about this. Probably shouldn't have brought it up, but it's just the kind of thing Mother would try to trip him up with if she had any suspicions that things here weren't as Regina claimed. So. Now it's out there.

Now it's out there, but that doesn't mean they need to dwell on it, so she sighs, "Me too," and adds a stern, "But I don't want your pity."

"You don't have it," he assures, giving her a gentle squeeze. "Just my sympathetic rage."

It makes her laugh softly, has her nodding, and telling him, "That I'll take. And um…" She bites her lip, gives him a look. "A few more of those kisses along my neck? If I haven't completely spoiled the mood, that is."

"You haven't," he assures, his own smile blooming as he draws her in close again. He starts at the join of her neck and shoulder, planting a slow line of damp kisses up, up, up, to make her gasp quietly.

She shouldn't indulge this too much longer, they've obviously gotten the job done and cleared the hurdle of casual physical contact. But she doesn't want to end the night thinking of Leo, of the cost of her poor decisions all those years ago, and the thing Robin just did with his tongue against the edge of her jaw does make her mind go pleasantly blank.

So maybe she'll be silly and selfish just a little while longer.


End file.
